AP Racing 11.75" Rotors for your BBK
 

We're working with Essex - AP Racing's US distributor - on a few upcoming projects. AP needs no introduction, their stuff is on championship winning cars from LeMans to Daytona. One of the benefits of our new relationship with them is AP's 11.75" rotors that are direct fit with any kit that uses the 11.75" Wilwood rotor. These are AP Racing's curved vane, J hook rotors. Perfect for high horsepower applications, engine swaps, road racing, endurance racing, etc. Basically in any case where you'd have a car eating through other rotors, switch to these.

Link to AP Racing rotor replacements

The best part is we have these on our shelf ready to ship, and we'll be keeping these in stock so you can rely on being able to get them.

http://www.mazdatalkforum.com/downlo...hp?id=3923&t=1

http://www.mazdatalkforum.com/download/file.php?id=3924

http://www.mazdatalkforum.com/downlo...3926&mode=view

And calipers? :D

Link is not working :(

I don't suppose they're $32 each? :)

--Ian

Fixed ;)

The real question is whether they are going to result in a savings of $102 over the life of the rotor through a combination of extended rotor and pad life.

My guess is that they are only possibly worth it for endurance racers that might be able to avoid an extra pad change.

Fixed the link, thanks.

The cheap wilwood rotors have their place. Street and autocross cars that put relatively light duty through the rotors are fine on those. Low power HPDE stuff with a novice to intermediate driver also OK. I would not run the cheap rotors on anything with decent power at the track. It's more than just a lifespan issue (which is no contest), it's also consistency, rotor temperature, pad life, etc. etc. For the endurance racers, they must run a rotor like this - the wilwoods are out of the question - but they are far from the only ones who can benefit a lot from a much better rotor. Not to mention, I'd rather still be on my first set of rotors when the guy running wilwoods would be doing his third or fourth rotor swap. There's a lot of areas of the car to keep an eye on and maintain, I want to use parts that last.

Is there any quantifiable test data to help us visualize the difference? I have a high horsepower car that will hopefully be getting back on the track soon. I am not an advanced driver and am not expecting to be competitive in anything as I just do HPDE for fun. This means I generally go for the best value in my parts and not necessarily the top performance. I am willing to spend the money if it can be proven that it is worth it but rotors seem to be one of those areas that I have seen plenty of people do just fine with the basics. Not trying to be combative but you gotta sell me with data instead of claims.

It can take years to go through one set of good rotors for someone who isn't at the track every weekend so the data doesn't develop overnight. For that reason, the reports we're getting from endurance racers are the most useful so far because they're getting so much race time in such an accelerated timeframe, but of course reports from others aren't as solid as data we collect ourselves and sometimes we don't have all the details, so I'm speaking in averages here from info from various cars but overall they're saying it's no comparison - wilwood rotors couldn't last one event and the AP's are doing multiple events, with a big jump in pad life from aballpark of 5-8 hours now up to 12+ hours. I'll be running these on Hyper (my car) with the new engine config. Top pic is the assembly going on that car. I plan to do some A/B tests so we have direct data once that car's up and running.

My recommendation for most guys unless they're doing full-on racing is to start off with a set of the wilwood rotors, see how those last you and then go from there. Most of the guys calling us asking for a high quality 11.75" rotor are calling after they burned through a set of the wilwoods and don't want to do that again.

Thanks for making these available to the Miata community. I'll likely pick up a set, since the quality on the Wilwood rotors seems to be pretty hit-or-miss and they do need to be changed often.

How do these compared to the spec 37 wilwood rotors as opposed to the cheap rotors

We use AP brakes on our porky E90 endurance car and they're not even close to their minimum spec. 50+ hours of runtime, including a 24 hour race. I'm gonna assume they'll do even better on a much lighter miata.

I am not having issues with going through rotors, but I think I might just not be using my cars brakes that hard.

That being said, I really want some awesome J-hook goodness. I'm in.

Found out that these are available as an upgrade to those buying a V8R big brake kit, and will replace the cheap wilwood rotors that come with their kit. For the $855 radial mount pro kit, it's a $180 upgrade

Is there a difference in weight?

Bob Bundy has tried a LOT of different rotors including the spec 37. It would be great to have his feed back on these too.

Depending on the pads used you may or may not need gas slots. That could be a deciding factor alone.

We used AP rotors on our Continental challenge Camaro. They performed flawlessly.

AP Rings are 8.6 lbs

How many vanes do these have?

The common listing seems to be "AP Racing 28 Vane J-Hook Brake Rotor RH - .810" - 11.75" - 8 Bolt" (and LH of course).
Very similarly listed in price to the Wilwood HD/GT 36.

But with my rotor consumption it will probably take about 4 years before it's time to consider a rotor change (the GT 36 have now seen about one hour of use), or even longer since I could make the 1.8 255mm rotors last four years with XP12 (but they were on the thin side at the end).
Who knows what's available in 2020, but Both AP and Wilwood seems to keep products for a long time.

I have had no issues with my 11.75 wilwood rotors, other than life. They last me about 6 track days. The end of their life, for me, is thermal fatigue cracking in the hat mount area. I will try these next year when my current brand new set of wilwood rotors does the same. I can see that these have a much higher radius curve in that area, as well as what looks like thicker material there, which should help with that issue significantly.

We have the best platform development community anywhere. Thanks guys. Now for a T5 swap, and roller bearing hubs, so everything is 350 capable!

FYI - I was getting cracking on my 11.75" BBK with race use but since moving to proper brake ducts/backing plates and 3" hoses (from average plates and 2" ducts) this has improved considerably.

It is still happening but in a much more controlled manner.

The lifespan of the cheap Willwood rotors for me now is about 10 -14 race meetings. About a season and a 1/2.

I am intrigued by these AP's not so much for better life, though I am sure they will and they is a win but the cost versus the lifespan of the cheap willwoods make it a not very cost effective upgrade for me...exchange rate, shiping, customs etc. ....but I am still interested in possibility of improved pad life.

I presume that the promise/premise of running cooler means the pad life will likely improve....?

Here's a data point on the Wilwood econo rotor, we ran these on a 225whp Miata weighing in at 2275lbs for almost 14 hours, I say almost as they cracked at the 13th hour and you could feel it with a notable pedal pulsing. We've run the PFC rings but they are harder to find and more expensive, just ordered a couple sets of these J hooks to see how they do at Mid-Ohio in two weeks.

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...ef5a81ecda.jpg

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.mia...31f6274252.jpg

Why not try something in between? I've had great results with the 949 rotors. The Wilwood Spec 37 rotors are good too!

Wilwood has options.

160-0471 Ultralight 32V Iron, 8.1Lbs $38.70 (Street use Only). garbage for heavy track use.
160-5841 Ultralight HP 23V better Iron,8.1Lbs$87.90 light or low hp track maybe
160-12283-4 HD 36V Curved Vane, Spec 37 Iron, 9.1Lbs $106.91 Good stuff lasts well for heavy track use.

New Wilwood might re space caliper for .99" width instead of .81.
160-13978-9 ULHD 16V Curved vane, Spec37 Iron, 7.1 Lbs. $86.25that’s light! want for autocross wonder if would work for the track but kind of doubt being its so light.
Wilwood Disc Brakes - Rotor No: 160-13978

Bad things always happened for me with any form of slots I don't think they add anything in way of performance.

Thank you for pointing out all the alternative rotors to the AP rings...? I'm aware of the other options.

Our goal has been to offer something at the top of the quality spectrum.

yea I suspect the AP are higher quality. But I wanted to add not all the Wilwood options are the same and there good ones cost almost as much as AP I've also used Coleman and some others with good results mostly I've found you get what you pay for, The cheap versioins Wilwoods are just cheap and not good for track use.

These AP's are cheaper than the top Wilwood options, are they not? $134/each vs $140/each.

MSRP from wilwood $106.91 actual price from Summit racing $98.99. Summit has other brands as well, I haven't tried AFCO but they make rotors as well. it be hard to get a real scientific comparison I bet. AP seems like the good stuff you find on serious race cars. Brembo use to mean quality but they sell a bunch of Chinese and Mexican cheap stuff as well.

Anyone try these yet? I'm shopping around for a rotor to replace my crappy $32 wilwood rotors.

for anybody interested in these, I found them online for 106dolars. only few left at this price tho, so be quick I guess ;-)
AP Racing 28 Vane J-Hook Brake Rotor LH - .810" - 11.75" - 8 Bolt : 1901793